


Third Jinchuuriki's the Charm

by enby0angel



Series: Hear No Evil (Deaf!Naruto AU) [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Deaf Naruto, Deaf Uzumaki Naruto, First Meeting, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Just you wait - Freeform, Lemme have a whole au for this guys, Pre-Canon, a budding friendship, please, seal space, these two are gonna be best bros
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-31 04:30:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19418524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enby0angel/pseuds/enby0angel
Summary: Kurama had been through two jinchuurikis so far, and he hadn’t liked either of them. Uzumaki Mito he had hated, he had despised with every fibre of his being. Uzumaki Kushina he had hated less but he still hated her.Therefore, he was absolutely seething when Uzumaki Kushina and her husband with his stupid smiley face had sealed him into a baby. An infant. How dare they.





	Third Jinchuuriki's the Charm

**Author's Note:**

> Hellooooooooo 'tis I! Barging back into Narutoland! With a new AU that I definitely WILL be revisiting sometime in the future! No guarantees when, though.
> 
> Deaf!Naruto has been on my mind for a while, and I eventually had to write a beginning for it. This is a bit longer than I originally intended but that's okaayyy I think it turned out good. A beginning!
> 
> I also love reading fics where Naruto and Kurama have a strong friendship, and I wish Kishimoto had explored it more in canon. Stop ignoring my calls, Kishimoto!  
> The Kurama & Naruto tag needs more fics. I just need more fics of these two comforting other and wreaking havoc. What a pair they make. Let Kurama be the unwilling big brother Naruto needs, dammit!!!
> 
> This is also part of my 100 Themes Challenge Writing series! The prompts were 43. "Nature's Fury" and 44. "Astonishment".
> 
> Okay, time for me to hush. I hope you enjoy!! <3

Kurama had been through two jinchuurikis so far, and he hadn’t liked either of them. Uzumaki Mito he had  _ hated _ , he had  _ despised _ with every fibre of his being. She was his original jailor, taker of his freedom. She had reduced him to nothing more than a seal and a burden. Uzumaki Kushina he had hated less - he had greatly admired her power of anger and her sheer force of will - but he still hated her. He was nothing but the Kyuubi to her, still a nuisance, still a burden.

Therefore, he was absolutely  _ seething _ when Uzumaki Kushina and her husband with his stupid smiley face had sealed him into a  _ baby _ . An  _ infant _ . How  _ dare _ they.

He was still weak, tired and angry when he was sealed into the Uzumaki brat, so all he could do was sleep and bide his time. One day he would break through this blasted seal, destroy this brat and then move onto the rest of this godforsaken village.

Never did Kurama imagine that the Uzumaki brat would come to  _ him  _ first.

Ever since he woke up in the seal space, it had been dark and cold. Dark and dirty water covered the ground except for a small mound inside of Kurama’s cage, where he spent most of his time sitting to avoid constantly being wet. Occasionally the water cleared a little bit, but for the most time it remained murky and muddy.

Kushina’s seal space had been a beach - Kurama’s cage was situated on the sand while Kushina rode the waves on the rare occasion she was in the seal space. He knew it had looked like that because it reminded her of Uzushiogakure, her first home, the place she visited in her dreams because she could not visit it in person. She missed it, but Kurama hadn’t felt sorry for her one bit.

Mito’s seal space had been a dark and cold cellar, because that was how she viewed Kurama: as a prisoner. She had given him the landscape she thought he deserved.

The brat’s seal space was nothing like his predecessors’; it reeked of sorrow and loneliness and helplessness. Was it the brat’s feelings or Kurama’s own? He couldn’t really tell.

Months and years went by, the seal space never lightening or looking even remotely cheery. Kurama spent that time sleeping and plotting. This was going fairly well for him until his regular routine of sleeping and plotting was interrupted by his jailor falling, less than gracefully, into the seal space.

Kurama blinked his eyes open. He blinked again, for a tiny  _ child _ was lying in the water before him. The child picked himself up and brushed himself off, brushing water and dirt out of his hair, and his eyes fell on Kurama. His very,  _ very _ blue eyes.

Oh, for the love of the Sage of Six-Paths, he was staring at the Uzumaki-Namikaze spawn, who in turn was staring at him with eyes wide and curious, but not scared. Kurama should fix that.

Kurama bared his teeth and growled low in his throat.

This did not deter the child. In fact, it did the exact opposite. He grinned, and Kurama’s growl cut off in surprise.

“Hi!” the kid yelled. Kurama’s ears flattened backwards at the noise level, and it annoyed him that it echoed around the almost-empty space. “I’m Naruto! Who are you? Where are we? How did you get here?” Kurama began to growl again at the kid’s barrage of questions, but once again this did nothing. It was like the kid didn’t even hear him, and neither was he at all worried at Kurama’s teeth - he was sure that one of his canines alone was the size of this little brat.

He managed to cut off the kid’s chatter by snarling, “Do you know what I am?”

The brat answered with an intelligent, “Huh? What’d you say?”

“Do you know,” Kurama repeated, becoming more annoyed by the second, “what I am?”

The brat shook his head. “Nope!” he said cheerfully. “You’re pretty awesome though!” Kurama blinked in surprise. “You look like a giant fox. Are you a fox?”

Kurama’s ears lifted just a little bit. He lowered his head to better look at the brat. He was very young, no older than five, with bright and curious eyes and… were those  _ whisker lines _ on his cheeks? He stared the kid right in the eyes. The kid stared right back.

“How did you get here?” he asked.

The kid tilted his head. “Huh?” he said again. “You say somethin’?”

Kurama narrowed his eyes at the child. “Can you not… hear me?” he asked, on a hunch.

The kid shuffled his feet, obviously uncomfortable. “What’d you say?” he asked again, quieter this time, more shy or nervous or scared or a mix of all three.

Moving his head closer to the child, Kurama asked again, but louder, “Can you not hear me?”

The kid nodded. “I heard you that time, but not the first time.” He shrugged. “It’s weird. Like, I could hear you makin’ noise but I couldn’t figure it out. It’s always been like that. People get really angry when I ask what they said.” He tilted his head again, sharper this time. He was like a puppy, it was almost irritating yet almost amusing. “But… you’re not angry are you?”

Kurama tilted his head to mirror the kid. “Are you deaf?” he asked.

The kid scrunched his face in confusion. “What’s that mean?”

“Someone who is deaf is someone who cannot hear,” Kurama explained, then asked himself,  _ Why am I entertaining this child. Why am I entertaining the Uzumaki spawn. Why. _

“I dunno.” The kid shrugged. “People always tell me to be quiet, but how am I supposed to hear myself if I’m quiet? I don’t get it. Isn’t it normal? People are always yelling at me all the time, so I thought it was normal. The only one who doesn’t yell all the time is jiji, but I don’t see him all that often cause I live on my own. Even other kids yell at me.”

Kurama sat back on his haunches and lifted his head to look at the endless ceiling. A familiar wave of pure rage and fury and  _ hatred _ towards Konoha filled him, but a long-lost urge and need to  _ protect _ rose with it. Did the village abandon this child? If it were Kiri he may understand, even Iwa, but  _ Konoha _ ? 

This child’s father was their Yondaime, his mother one of their fiercest and most beloved warriors. Did this child not know his heritage? Did the village? 

Kurama may have hated Konoha and humanity in general, but children held no malice, no ill-will, no fury or hate. Not even he, Kurama, the Kyuubi, hated anything as a youngling. So for anyone to hold any malice, ill-will, fury or hate towards a child who had done nothing wrong…

The village abandoned him because of Kurama. The realisation hit him suddenly. He did not feel guilty but he did feel…

Angry. It was not either of their faults. The child being forced to become a jinchuuriki, Kurama being forced to become a slave to his own destructive power… the village abandoned both of them.

Kurama looked back down at the child, who looked nervous now. Kurama marveled that it was incredible that the child showed no fear in the face of a monster bearing its teeth at him, but was more afraid of others’ anger and rejection.

Humans were a corrupt race, but anyone neglecting a child was unacceptable, even to the feared Kyuubi of the Bijuu.

Kurama lay down and lowered his head until he was at eye level with the child. “It is not normal for humans to not be able to hear things. Your condition is… unusual and life-altering and sets you further aside from your peers. But it is not life-ending. Many shinobi before you have gotten by with hindered senses.”

The kid’s eyes brightened and a wide grin split across his face. “I can still be a ninja even without being able to hear everything?” he asked excitedly, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet.

“Yes,” Kurama nodded. “It will be difficult and you will have to hone your other senses to compensate, but it is possible.”

“ _ Yes! _ ” the kid cheered, punching the air.

Kurama huffed in reluctant amusement. “What did you say your name was, brat?”

With a blinding grin the kid answered, “Naruto! Uzumaki Naruto!” So, the kid didn’t know of his father after all. “What’s your name?”

Kurama blinked. “What?”

“What’s your name?” the kid - Naruto - asked again. “Do you have one?”

Blinking again, Kurama hesitated in something akin to shock. In less than ten minutes this kid had flipped his worldview on his head, genuinely  _ talked _ to him and had done something nobody had done in decades,  _ centuries _ even - this child had  _ asked his name _ .

Kurama made a decision in that moment. This child, he would protect. This child who had done nothing wrong, who had been abandoned by his village and his people, he would protect. And Sage help him, he knew he would regret this one day but for the love of  _ kami _ this kid deserved a chance.

“Kurama,” he finally answered, and Naruto’s face lit up with glee. “My name is Kurama.”

He may regret this, but when Naruto’s tiny little hand reached through the bars of his cage to pat his nose, he decided that it was worth it.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading!!! Comments and kudos are always appreciated <3
> 
> Visit me on tumblr @enby-angel! <3


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